Blog entries have been a little sparse on the ground around here. The reasons for that would be a blog post in itself so for now I'll put this up which I started drafting in August but is still relevant now.

In the last couple of months of my second pregnancy I got a lot of ultrasound scans. Mostly to monitor my cyst but also to make sure Leo was growing okay. He definitely was...in fact he was on the 91st percentile of fetus size. I'm not tiny but I'm only 5'4" and already had had one average size baby who felt quite large enough, thank you very much! 

Leo kept right on that curve until the scan I had the day before he arrived. During that appointment I was on the table a while because my cyst was growing back and also because they were trying to measure just how much extra amniotic fluid I was carrying. In that time I convinced myself that if the baby got any bigger I was going to burst.

So it was a huge relief to find I was already two cm dilated when I got a membrane sweep. My consultant and I agreed that the excess fluid and risk of the cyst being ruptured by the rapidly growing baby were motivating factors to break my waters the following day in the hope that I would start labouring once they went. I'm so not ready to give you my birth story yet, but the short version is, I had a nearly 9lb baby with no pain relief and flat on my back with my feet in stirrups because the registrar apparently was not a fan of Ina May Garten's advice for suspected shoulder dystocia, 

Poor Leo, we hadn't had a home birth, we weren't home after six hours and when the paediatrician told us the next morning that he had a heart murmur, I thought my heart was going to implode. There are so many reasons that may have caused it, but whatever the reason actually was, I was convinced it was the manner of his birth. So I was a tad emotional when after the all clear from the cardiologist, a paperwork error meant we had a duplicate appointment to be told the same thing at the Paediatric clinic. And the doctor assumed I was formula feeding and told me that I was overfeeding Leo and was increasing his chances of obesity, 

She was warming up to a lecture on the perils of feeding extra to increase sleep when I managed to engage my brain, tell her we'd already seen the cardiologist and inform her that my boy was exclusively breastfed. That he had been on the 91st percentile in utero and that I was rather proud of the fact that my feeding him on demand was keeping him on the same growth curve. I was even more proud of the fact that I didn't swear or call anyone inept before we left.

So I guess the point of this blog is, know your baby and be confident in the way you choose to feed your baby, whether that's breastfeeding, combination feeding or formula. I wasn't with Sam and let a well intentioned person convince me that my milk was making Sam colicky. So I would try absolutely everything else to appease him when he cried instead of feeding him by which point I was crying too. Having a baby isn't ever easy but it's really not supposed to be that hard.

I look at Leo, who gets fed as soon as he makes a murmur. He's already so big but also so tiny, he fits onto me perfectly, his little form moulding to my contours. There are so many moments when I think to myself, I should lay him down and get on with things but then I remember how quickly Sam grew out of this particular need for me and so I keep Leo's silky head under my chin and revel in the fact that I am a sentimental fool, with a really big baby!

I'll keep polishing off these older drafts, written on my phone in the wee small hours, to mix in with newer stuff. Coming up, I've got a review of reusable nappy from a French company and the story of that time we thought it would be a breeze to take two small children to London and were pleasantly surprised that it was. If you want to read my less green writing, have a look at Not Out Loud where I've been confessing my many many shortcomings recently.

I've fallen off the regular blogging wagon again! But here is this week's Dunfermline Press Column with bonus pictures and I promise I will divert some of the pregnant manic energy away from the garden and toddler birthday season and put it into regular writing.

We celebrated Valentine's Day with an Foetal Anomaly scan. My morning sickness has now reduced to the level of just mild nausea if I remember to take my tablets, beforehand the tablets meant that I was only throwing up once a day rather than three or four times a day. I've managed to gain back the ten lbs I lost during my first trimester plus a couple more and I'm at the stage where I have a recognisable baby bump rather than people thinking I must have overdone the Christmas chocolate munching.

Everything is looking good with Wee Green Baby v.2 and the fact that I was worrying about a lack of kicking was explained during the scan by where my placenta is lying. The lack of feeling the movement is because there's a cushion in the way, this baby is as just as much of a kung fu fighter as Sam was in utero, so much so that it took a while to get all the measurements done.

To celebrate the reduction in puking, the healthy baby and Sam's impending big brother status, we decided the following day would be a day trip to somewhere none of us had been before. The Falkirk Wheel is one of those things it seems silly not to have visited because it's so close but it's also too nearby to spring immediately to mind when we're planning outings.

Sam loves any car trip that involves the motorway because of the van and lorry watching opportunities. His vehicle spotting happiness continued to grow when we arrived and found the car park was next to a railway line, the kid loves nothing more than trains! He was also completely delighted by the narrow boats on the canal so maybe he'll avoid his granny's legendary seasickness.

The boy was suitably impressed by the scale models of the water horse sculptures we'd passed on the drive through and obligingly said cheese while his dad and I took photos of him. He also said it for a random passing tourist who happened by with a camera!

The visitor centre is big and bright and airy with lots of accessible information on the history of the Wheel. All a bit advanced for Sam just now, but we'll keep it in mind for when he's a bit older too. We weren't up for a boat trip as we weren't sure our active toddler would appreciate being constrained from jumping out of the boat at will but we went out to have a look at the Wheel and had a bracing walk in the February sunshine to see all the boats. Sam was most interested in the gate mechanism for the lock.

He only got interested in the Wheel itself when we stopped in the café for a snack. The cafe has a wide selection of tasty food with plenty of healthy options for children as well as a recycling station for your trays but it's main attraction is the big glass ceiling. Sam was thrilled to be able to watch the Wheel turn as he ate his snack and when he saw the boats being lifted he renamed the attraction as the Falkirk Wheeeeeee!

In my last post, I mentioned it was okay to eat while reading. This one...not so much. From about 5 and a half weeks into this pregnancy I've ranged from "green around the gills" to "Linda Blair on The Exorcist looks tame by comparison". I sometimes hesitate to use the term Hyperemesis Gravidarum but since that's what's the GP called it when he referred me for my second hospital stay of this pregnancy, I'll go with it.

From what I can work out from my extensive research (*ahem* Google addiction), 50% of pregnant women get some form of morning sickness, 25% get landed with nausea and 3% make it into the HG camp. This leads me to believe that women who don't get anything are practicing witchcraft...just kidding...sort of. I'm a little bitter about being in the minority, and mine is usually quite manageable with medication and IV fluids. I try not to be melodramatic as I'm painfully aware of how lucky I am to have access to top level health care free at the point of delivery.

Although I try to be pragmatic and tell myself that I'm fortunate to know that the baby is thriving, when I've been throwing up for 18 hours I tend to get a little downhearted. I knew that having had HG before, it was likely to occur again. I had a lot of grand plans about a perfectly planned diet of super healthy, frequent small meals, slow energy release foods and lots of ginger that would help me cruise through the first trimester with just a hint of nausea. I also had an emergency supply of Irn Bru and salt & vinegar crisps because that's what helped when I was pregnant with Sam. However, this baby had other plans. When I was six weeks along, I got up at the usual time with Sam, had some porridge and a banana and went for a brisk walk round the local loch so Sam could feed the ducks. Halfway round the (thankfully deserted) loch, I had my first public vomit of this pregnancy. On the plus side, I was able to add to my list of foods that aren't that bad to regurgitate. On the negative side, Sam now thinks it's perfectly reasonable to jump into bushes because he's seen his mummy do it.  Also, this baby does not care for Irn Bru or salt & vinegar crisps, although he or she can occasionally be appeased by peanut butter on toast!

It was all downhill from there to week 8 when I had my first trip to the maternity ward for anti-emetic injections (by the way, when they say 'intramuscular' they mean 'a jab in the backside') and re-hydration fluids. That first trip made us aware of the new dynamic of finding someone to look after Sam while poor Euan drove Pukey McPukerson to the hospital. Thankfully, despite giving me the aforementioned renaming, my sister also stepped up for babysitting duties. I'm totally blessed with a first class family of Sam-carers but I'm finding the feeling of not being able to care for him myself sometimes to be one of the harder aspects of the bad days.

I'm also not enjoying the fact that when the medication is stopping me throw up, it's also making me drowsy to the point that I feel like I'm wading through treacle while Hurricane Sam runs rings around me. I've learned the value of picking my battles, rather than panicking about rotting his brain, I've learned to be thankful for the half hour sitting quietly sitting on the couch while Sam indulges his Octonaut or Thomas the Tank obsession. I've also used this as an opportunity to encourage a bit more of his independence, I don't follow his every footstep when he's playing indoors and at the park, as a result he seems to be getting more and more confident in his own abilities.

I think he's going to make a brilliant big brother, while I've been laid low I've been able to appreciate just how good he is at helping out with little tasks and just how gentle he can be to the people around him. Now, if I could just stop gagging when I have to change his nappy during a queasy spell, I would be totally cool about the prospect of being a mummy of two...

Wee Green Mummy of Two

I've been trying to write this blog entry for over a week now, it's not that it's been unimportant, just that there was a combination of Christmas, a failed attempt at moving Sam to a big boy bed and many many rounds of morning sickness (the vomit will feature in the next entry so it's safe to read this one whilst eating!).

In the slideshow above, you can see the reason for the title, we are going to be a family of four around about the start of July. I'm not giving my due date because I did that last time and had five days of helpful comments along the lines of, “is that baby ever coming out?” and “you look like you're going to explode”!

That's my favourite benefit of a second pregnancy, you have a much better idea of what's going on and can make a few changes. For us, it's a first time planned pregnancy, Sam was a delightful surprise, we knew we wanted to have babies together, we just didn't realise how quickly we'd be doing it.

This time, we were able to stop contraception at a convenient time, we'd finished settling in to our new house and our big family trip for a wedding in the USA was only a couple of weeks away. I thought that it may take a while and had invested in a Basal Body Temperature Thermometer and some ovulation strips, I'd even made up a spread sheet (being married to an economist rubs off on you sometimes!). My GP had mentioned an average of three months all being well and Euan and I had agreed we would give it six months before we worried. The ovulation strips were cheap and easy to use...and apparently also very effective, as Carmichael Jnr #2 was conceived in a month! I was obviously elated but also felt a little silly, maybe I should have held off on the technical support until we'd been trying a while!

Finding out this time was an experience (well, it was an experience last time too, but this time no-one uttered the phrase WTF). We were at the end of a beautiful family holiday, we'd explored and been delighted by Boston, we'd attended the wedding of two of our dearest friends, and we were staying in the most heart-achingly beautiful hotel, The Old Custom House, in the centre of downtown Boston. Sam was soaking in all the sights and new experiences and had weathered the time change like a pro-jetsetter and I had been so happy the whole week getting to share one of my favourite places with Euan. So we were all in very relaxed and happy state of mind when I realised I was a wee bit late. I swithered about waiting until we got home to do a test, but I'm the kind of person who has to have her birthday and Christmas presents hidden to prevent early opening and I'd also felt downright weird with dizziness, tiredness and hunger all day so I couldn't resist taking the test I'd packed just in case. Euan came back from collecting ice to find me stretching up to the only bright light in the apartment to see the very faint but unmistakeable second line on the test.

We decided to wait a little while to start telling people, which was an easy decision to make when we had an ocean separating us from our nearest and dearest. As soon as we were back though, it quickly became apparent that the new offspring was just as efficient as Sam had been at turning mummy into an extra for the Walking Dead. I'm not one of those fortunate souls who glows through pregnancy, even before the nausea kicked in, I was pale and ex.haus.ted. One of the midwifes who works at the clinic where I do my real nappy info sessions was quick to tell me that I was looking “peaky”, my midwife mother later translated for me, “peaky” means “knocked-up” in midwife speak.

I also realised that should anything go wrong, I would feel better if the people we're close to knew what was up. So our immediate family found out, closely followed by other family and my lovely support network of fellow mummies and my university buddies. The joy of sharing our special news was a definite comfort when the nausea did kick in and looking forward to our first glimpse of the new family member was one of the only things that got me through the really hard days of toddler wrangling combined with hyperemesis. The transition from mum of one to mum of two will definitely be fuel for thought for the upcoming blog posts.